1. Technical Field
The disclosed subject matter provides solutions for building and maintaining a descriptor repository used to describe financial transactions. In particular, aspects of the technology provide systems and methods for crowdsourcing details of descriptor labels (i.e., descriptor definitions) associated with merchant transactions, for use in contextualizing financial transactions.
2. Introduction
Many merchants provide basic financial transaction information for purchases processed using a payment service, such as a credit or debit card, bank account, PayPal, or an alternative payment method. As used herein, financial transaction information that is initially provided by merchants is referred to as a merchant descriptor label or “descriptor label.” Descriptor labels are generally included on payment authorizations and/or settlement transactions and posted to the cardholder's statement. Descriptor labels provide the consumer with information about the purchase, including for example, a name of the associated merchant. The intent is to remind the consumer what goods and/or services were purchased on the specified date and for the specified amount.
However, most descriptor labels are not standardized or easily understood, making it difficult for the consumer to recognize the transaction and recall the purpose of the purchase. As a result, the task of trying to understand an itemized bill, such as a credit statement, or bank statement, is often difficult for the consumer, leaving him/her to guess the reason for a particular transaction, or what goods/services were purchased. This confusion results in consumers contacting their financial institution to dispute the transaction. Often the consumer will claim that he/she does not recognize the transaction. This is not only frustrating for the consumer, but also, when aggregated across many such cases, a cause of considerable expense for the financial institution handling the consumer calls.